2011-12 Broadway preview

In this theater publicity image released by The Hartman Group, Richard Fleeshman, left, and Caissie levy are shown in a scene from "Ghost The Musical." "Ghost The Musical" is one of the new anticipated productions coming this season. (AP Photo/Sean Ebsworth Barnes, Sean Ebsworth Barnes)

By MARK KENNEDY

AP Drama Writer

NEW YORK

If Broadway last season was dominated by a glitzy Spider-Man, Broadway’s new season seems to be shaping up more like his workaday alter ego, Peter Parker.

A quieter, less-risky year is in the cards, with fewer big movie stars hitting the boards and less razzle- dazzle in favor of more tried-and-tested material. Spidey’s follies have given way to Sondheim’s “Follies.”

Along with those established stars will be veteran writers: Arthur Miller, Noel Coward, Woody Allen, Athol Fugard, Tennessee Williams, Terence Rattigan, Theresa Rebeck, David Auburn and David Henry Hwang.

The new season actually began right after the Tony Awards with the official opening of a little musical called “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.” After a full season of previews, accidents, mocking, rejigging and cancellations, the $75 million show has settled down to become a consistent top earner.

Perhaps the spectacle at the Foxwoods Theatre affected producers this year — huge, risky gambles with splashy, overtly commercial productions seem to have been greatly minimized. For many shows, either the actors or the material already has proven its strength. And after a season that had plenty of new musicals and relatively few play revivals, the reverse is now the case.

One of the most anticipated plays will be Katori Hall’s “The Mountaintop,” a fictional drama about the night before the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. starring Samuel L. Jackson and Angela Bassett. Two other emerging female playwrights also make their Broadway debuts. Lydia R. Diamond offers “Stick Fly,” a drama about a well-to-do black family with Alicia Keys producing, and Lisa D’Amour brings her darkly comic play “Detroit” in the spring.

The first new musical — and one of the few — will be “Bonnie & Clyde,” starring Laura Osnes and Jeremy Jordan as the bank-robbing lovers with music by Frank Wildhorn. The stars might not be household names, but they’re old hands with gorgeous voices. Wildhorn, meanwhile, will be looking to bounce back from his last season offering “Wonderland,” which was poorly received.

There will be four musical revivals: Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Evita”; Stephen Schwartz’s “Godspell”; “Funny Girl” with Ambrose; and Sondheim’s “Follies,” which wowed the crowds in Washington, D.C., and kept the cast of Peters, Jan Maxwell and Elaine Paige for the drive north.

The musical about Eva Peron marks the first time the Tony Award-winning musical has been mounted on Broadway since it made its way there more than 30 years ago. Casting has been wily, with a mix that includes a celebrity (Ricky Martin plays Che), a theater pro (Cerveris will be Juan Peron) and an emerging talent in Argentine actress Elena Roger, who got rapturous reviews in the title role in London.

Laying the groundwork for the “Evita” revival will be the original stars together in concert. Patti LuPone (the original Eva) and Mandy Patinkin (her Che) will perform their touring concert at the Ethel Barrymore Theater. During the show, LuPone and Patinkin sing songs by Sondheim, Rodgers and Hammerstein, Jerome Kern and Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Another show imported from London will be “End of the Rainbow,” a play with music about Judy Garland’s last few months alive, starring Tracie Bennett. From closer to home — Chicago’s Goodman Theatre — comes the new comedy “Chinglish” by Hwang.

There also will be two reimagined works: “On a Clear Day You Can See Forever” with a new book and with Connick playing a dashing psychiatrist; and a new “Porgy and Bess” in December starring McDonald that has been revised by director Diane Paulus and playwright-librettist Suzan Lori-Parks.

“Porgy and Bess,” by George and Ira Gershwin and DuBose and Dorothy Heyward, has a new ending and some character development. It also has some controversy. Sondheim heard about the changes and sneered, kicking up an unusual public spat for a show still in the works and months before its Broadway arrival.

In an odd twist, Gershwin songs also will be heard in another show this season — “Nice Work If You Can Get It,” a new screwball musical starring Broderick, directed and choreographed by Kathleen Marshall (“Anything Goes”) with a book by Joe DiPietro (“Memphis”). It will be Broderick’s first Broadway musical since “The Producers.”

Cult films this season are helping fuel two shows: a musical adaptation of the 2003 Tim Burton film “Big Fish” and an adaptation of the movie “Once,” about a Dublin musician who falls in love with a Czech singer.

James Earl Jones will bridge last season and the new one, going from the chauffeur in “Driving Miss Daisy” to playing a former U.S. president in a revival of the political play “Gore Vidal’s The Best Man” in the spring, just in time for the new election cycle. Jones, who has won two Tonys for “The Great White Hope” and “Fences,” is believed to have been the first black actor to play an American president in the 1972 movie “The Man.”

Times Square also will be haunted by an adaptation of the Patrick Swayze-Demi Moore film “Ghost,” making its way from London. The book was written by Bruce Joel Rubin, who penned the script for the hit 1990 music, and the music is by former Eurythmics musician Dave Stewart and Glen Ballard, who produced Alanis Morisette’s “Jagged Little Pill.”